Humans, Beasts, and Ghosts

by Zhongshu Qian

  Shortly before noon, there was no sign of Tianjian. The maid, famished herself, urged them to eat. Since they had no choice, husband and wife sat across from each other and began to eat. An even-tempered man, Caishu said smilingly to his wife, “He was never that firm about coming. We were the only ones who were certain. Lucky we didn’t spend too much. The courtyard hasn’t been cleaned like that for some time. I wonder how the maid usually sweeps it?”

  Manqian said, “It isn’t a question of the money, but rather of all the planning that went into it. A fine Sunday has been spoiled by him. If he was coming, he should have said so; if no, he should have made himself clear. He was noncommittal, and we’ve been kept busy for him. Only someone as naive as you would take a casual remark as a solemn promise.”

  Her unpleasant expression made Caishu put in quickly, “Even if he comes, we won’t entertain him. That boy’s been inconsiderate since childhood. After lunch we can take a walk in the park. Since the weather is so nice, you won’t have to change your clothes.”

  Manqian assented. In her heart she judged Tianjian to be genuinely disgusting.

  Another week and more went by, during which time Tianjian did not come. After Caishu got home one day, he mentioned that he had seen Tianjian with a young woman. “He was very vague about the whole thing; he didn’t introduce the girl. Must be some new girlfriend of his. That kid is too much. The girl looks all right, except for the way she was dressed. Too provocative—definitely not a native of this area. When he heard we’d been waiting for him to come to lunch, he apologized. He said he had intended to come but couldn’t because something else had come up. He said he’ll visit us in a few days, and he wanted me to send his regards and his sincere apologies to you beforehand.”

  “Come here in ‘a few days’? How many days, then?” Manqian asked coldly.

  “Let him come whenever he likes; we don’t have to make any preparations anyway. He and I are relatives, and there’s no need for formality. I think he’s madly in love right now, and it’s likely he won’t have time to come in the immediate future. I’m afraid we’re getting old. For example, when I saw the young couple together today, I wasn’t jealous at all. For some reason I felt them naive enough to be pitied. There are so many ups and downs awaiting them; they have yet to be fooled and manipulated by fate. For us married folks, life has settled down—like a boat that has entered its harbor and no longer fears the storm. Though we’ve been married for only two years, we can consider ourselves an old married couple.”

  Manqian smiled and said, “Don’t say us, just you!”—a line she borrowed from Heroic Sons and Daughters,5 spoken by Thirteenth Sister to a “faceless” woman. Manqian and her husband had borrowed and finished reading that novel, and they had appropriated expressions from it to tease each other. When Caishu saw his wife being naughty and teasing him, he begged for a kiss. Intoxicated with his own passion, he did not sense her indifference.

  For better than half the night, Manqian could not fall asleep. The snores of a tired Caishu did not relieve the tense vibrations that permeated her whole body. Quietly she lay there wondering why at such a young age she should be so tired of love. No, not only of love, but of everything. She had been married for only a little over two years, but the marriage was as stale and boring as if she had been married a lifetime. “For us married folks, life has settled down,” was what he had said. Yes, the truth was that since meeting Caishu she had never experienced any fluctuations in her feelings. The fear of outside forces interfering with their love affair did once exist, but there had always been sufficient mutual confidence and assurance. Groundless suspicions, deliberate misunderstandings, and other assorted delicate torments associated with romance were wholly outside her experience. There never was any bitterness, spiciness, sourness, or harshness, but always the taste of clear tea.

  Her relationship with him now was like fresh boiling water poured over old tea leaves—the tea gets weaker after each infusion. Days went by as if she had not lived them, eventlessly, as if time bore no relationship to her. Soon she would be thirty—the way she aged, it really wasn’t worth it. It would be better if she did have a baby, to reduce some of the emptiness of life; she might as well reconcile herself to being a mother. In the beginning she had a faint hope of getting a job so she could be part of society and not confined to her home. She was unwilling to lose her role outside the family after she got married. At first she feared a baby would be a hindrance to love and she’d rather not have one. Then she didn’t know if Caishu would want a baby; she was afraid he couldn’t afford it. When would this dreadful war come to an end?

  Manqian rose late. By the time she had gotten up, Caishu had left for work. She had not slept for the better part of the night. Her head felt heavy and her eyelids too weighty to lift themselves, and she was afraid to take a good look at her long, sallow face in the mirror. After washing her face and rinsing her mouth, she had little energy for anything else. No one would come this morning, and she was too lazy to tidy herself up. After resting a bit she felt better. The maid had gone to the market and returned. Donning her plain green cloth apron, she helped the maid prepare lunch. While they were in the midst of this, they heard a knock on the front door. She wondered who could be visiting at this hour. The maid ran to open the door. Suddenly she remembered that she had not combed her hair, had not made up her face, and that she smelled of grease. She definitely could not receive a visitor, and she was sorry she had not told the maid so. She heard the maid running all the way to the kitchen yelling, “Madam, madam,” and saying that the man was surnamed Zhou, who said he was a relative of the master’s, had come to visit the master and mistress, and was standing in the courtyard. The maid wondered if she should invite the guest in.

  Manqian knew the caller was Tianjian. Flustered and annoyed by the maid’s garrulousness, she did not know what to do. Scolding the maid, her first impulse, would not help matters. Should she go out to greet the guest? She felt ashamed of her condition, and since this was their first meeting, she did not want to be too embarrassed. If she were to put on some makeup and receive him, she must go to the bedroom and to go to the bedroom she must pass the courtyard, which was right outside the kitchen. Not wanting to be seen in her condition, and there being no chance to make up, she was forced to tell the maid to inform the guest that the master wasn’t home but would be informed of his visit and that the master would return his visit shortly. The maid answered in a loud voice, and left.

  A wave of shame overtook Manqian, and she didn’t trouble to find out if the maid had relayed the message correctly. She felt she had been less than civil to her guest, who certainly knew she had been hiding in the kitchen, unwilling to come out. Perhaps he would have forgiven her for her less-than-neat appearance and for not having had time to make up properly. Yet it was truly disgraceful that the cousin’s so-called talented and beautiful wife had been unable to receive her guest because she smelled of kitchen smoke. Really it was Tianjian’s fault. Of all the times he could have called, why did he choose that time to come, and so abruptly? While she fumed, the maid came back to tell her the guest had said he’d come again on Saturday afternoon. Manqian, full of frustrations, scolded the maid for having yelled at the top of her lungs when a visitor called. The maid, peeved, threatened to quit. This only exasperated Manqian more. When her husband came home for lunch, she told him what had happened in the morning and blamed him for having a mischievous troublemaker from God knows where for a cousin.

  Even though husband and wife said they didn’t want to go out of their way to entertain Tianjian, Caishu brought some pastries when he came home around noon on Saturday. And after lunch, Manqian herself spent some time making herself presentable. The last time she had made herself up, she had merely wanted to show her respect for her guest. Good manners dictated that she not be seen with her hair uncombed and her face unadorned. But this time, it was completely different, for she was still subconsciously very much affected by the shame and emb
arrassment she had felt two days ago when she couldn’t see Tianjian. Though Tianjian had never seen her, she felt he must have an image of her as a smoked-up, greasy, untidy woman working by the stove. So today she must pay extra attention to her appearance to restore her tarnished reputation. Unconsciously, she put powder on her face in a more obvious way, to appeal to someone with Tianjian’s crude sense of aesthetics.

  A little after three, Tianjian came, with some gifts. On meeting him, Manqian was pleasantly surprised. Tianjian did not appear to be the slick, crude young man she had expected to dislike. Like all air force personnel, he was tall and strong, but his facial features were finely chiseled, and his manner of speaking seemed more refined than Caishu’s. What was more, his suit was well tailored without giving the impression of being either unsophisticated or slick. Even during their first meeting, his words of courtesy toward her seemed affectionate, and one could tell he was experienced in social relations. Of course, Caishu had much to say to him, but she could tell he didn’t want to spend all his time talking about his past with her husband and ignoring her. From time to time he broadened the conversation deliberately so as to involve her in it. Yes, the facts wouldn’t allow her to dislike Tianjian, unless she was offended by his frequent, sly glances at her. One time, when he was gazing at her, she was looking at him at the same time. She blushed instantly and her eyes blurred like a mirror someone had fogged with hot breath. But then he gave her a candid smile and asked casually what she did for recreation.

  What a smart man Tianjian was! Since Tianjian’s gifts to them were quite expensive, husband and wife felt they had to invite him to eat with them the next evening. The long-scheduled dinner had to be given after all.

  The next day Manqian was busy all afternoon until she felt she could entrust the remaining housework to the maid, and then went to her room to change. Tianjian came shortly, and since Caishu had not yet returned from visiting a friend, the job of entertaining the guest fell to Manqian alone. Trying to be calm, she searched the fringes of her brain for things to say. Fortunately, Tianjian was a good conversationalist. Whenever she, in embarrassment, ran out of things to say, he would subtly touch on something else as if erecting a floating bridge to connect the ever-widening cracks, so linking the threads of conversation. She realized that he knew her predicament and was sympathetic. As she pondered this she felt the situation was a bit amusing, and she also felt grateful toward him.

  Tianjian said he wanted very much to try Manqian’s cooking, but he feared that would give her extra work, and hence he felt a conflict in himself. He added that he enjoyed cooking too and would demonstrate his culinary skills sometime.

  Manqian smiled. “It’s lucky I didn’t know you were so talented. I don’t know much about cooking. Next time, if you come here to eat, I won’t dare prepare dishes for you—I’ll just have to serve you plain rice.”

  Tianjian had the ability to make new acquaintances feel like old friends, and his enthusiasm was so infectious that it made social intercourse easy. Without being aware of it, Manqian relaxed.

  When Caishu came home, he saw his wife and cousin in a happy mood, and his wife with some animation in her gentleness. He knew that her prejudices against his cousin had all dissolved and was very pleased. When they sat down to eat, the three cast formalities aside—especially Manqian, who had never known that being a hostess could be so easy and entertaining a guest so relaxing.

  Tianjian told them about many of the things he had done before coming to town. He also said that a man from the same province had recently prepared a room for him at his house, and that sometimes when it was too late to return to the academy he would stay there.

  Caishu then thought of Tianjian’s woman companion and asked, “I imagine you must have quite a few girlfriends. Who was the one I saw you with the other day?”

  Taken aback for a moment, Tianjian asked, “Which day?”

  Manqian interrupted wickedly: “What he meant was ‘Which one?’ I think he has girlfriends with him every day, and he doesn’t remember them all.”

  Tianjian laughed, looking at her. “Now I can see for myself you’ve got a sharp tongue, Biaosao,6 but frankly, I don’t remember.”

  Making a funny face, Caishu said, “Don’t play dumb. It was the day I met you around Sun Yat-sen Road. She was round faced and wore purple. With all the evidence, aren’t you going to confess?”

  “Oh, that one,” Tianjian said. “That’s my landlord’s daughter.”

  Manqian and Caishu thought they would hear more about this, but their guest paused and had no more to offer, as if a torrent of words ready to flow had been dammed and reclaimed by silence.

  Unable to bear the suspense any longer, husband and wife commented simultaneously, “No wonder you want to live with her family!”

  To explain himself, Tianjian said, “It’s like this. My landlord is an old lady, and her nephew and I were very good friends when I was in Sichuan. When I came here, her nephew wrote me a letter of introduction, and it happened that she had a lot of space, and she let me have one spare room.7 She has a son and a daughter. The son still goes to school, and the daughter, who graduated from college this past summer, works as a clerk in some office. She’s quite pretty and knows how to apply cosmetics and dress herself up. She loves fun so much that her mother can’t do much about her.” He stopped at this point; then he added, “Many colleagues from the air force academy go out with her. I’m not the only one.”

  A clerk himself, Caishu realized that she was a “flower vase.”8 Before he could say a word, Manqian’s laughter exploded like bubbling water as she said, “You could call that girl an aircraft carrier.” Caishu laughed involuntarily. Tianjian seemed momentarily stunned by the remark, but he quickly regained his composure and started to laugh too.

  Having made the remark, Manqian was irritated with herself for not having weighed her words before uttering them. As she looked at Tianjian she saw that his smile was perfunctory at best and was doubly unhappy that she might have offended him. After all, that girl might be his girlfriend. She felt she had spoken more than usual, and her garrulousness had caused her gaffe. As she mulled this over, she lost her enthusiasm and began to watch her words. At the same time she noticed that Tianjian had become inhibited. Maybe she was just being too suspicious.

  The only one who remained unruffled was Caishu. He kept talking about this and that and eased the discomfort between host and guest. The dinner seemed interminably long. When it was finally over, Tianjian said good-bye to Caishu and Manqian, thanking her again and again and praising her excellent cooking. She, of course, knew this was his social routine, but from his repeated thanks she could see his respect for her and felt somewhat pleased. As she and her husband saw Tianjian out of the courtyard, her husband said, “Tianjian, if you don’t mind this place being shabby, just drop in and visit us when you have the time. In any case, Manqian is home most of the time, and she’s bored. You two can talk.”

  “Of course, I’d love to come. But I’m afraid people like me are so crass that we aren’t qualified to speak to Biaosao.” Though a smile lessened the severity of his tone, his reply implied hostility and challenge. Fortunately, the dark night by the front door concealed their faces and allowed Manqian to blush in safety.

  Assuming a normal tone of voice, Manqian said, “I’m only afraid you wouldn’t be willing to come. If you came, I’d be more than pleased. I’ve been a housekeeper for so long that I can only talk about homemaking. What’s more, I’ve never been a good conversationalist.”

  “Don’t be polite, either of you,” Caishu interrupted. Thus, amid abundant “Goodbyes,” and “Take cares,” Tianjian left them.

  Two days later, in the afternoon, Manqian was just planning to knit something new from the yarn she had unraveled from an old sweater, soaked, and hung out in the sun to straighten, when suddenly she heard Tianjian coming. She felt that he had come especially for her that day, because he knew it was too early for her husband to have ret
urned from work. This knowledge made her very constrained and ill at ease. She said hello, she asked how he had found the time to come, and then she couldn’t think of another word to say. The friendliness of two days past seemed to have disappeared.

  Spying the yarn on the table, Tianjian smiled. “I came especially to give you a hand,” he said. Hoping to ease her own unnatural reserve, Manqian suddenly became unusually bold and said, “You came at the right time. I was worried because there was no one to help me with this. Caishu’s wrists are clumsy and he can’t do this properly. Now I have a perfect chance to try you out, though I’m afraid you may not have the patience. First let me separate the yarn.”

  So one stretched the yarn in both hands, while the other wound it into separate balls. Even when they said nothing to each other, the yarn maintained a continual contact between them and spared them the trouble of looking for things to say. When two or three balls of yarn had been wound, Manqian, afraid that Tianjian might have become bored, suggested he quit, but he refused and continued helping her until all the yarn on the table had been wound up. At this point he rose, commenting that he hoped his wrists and patience had passed her test. He said he must leave and couldn’t wait for Caishu to come home.

  With great sincerity, Manqian apologized. “I’ve put you through too much! I’m afraid you’ll be scared to come back again after this punishment.”

  Tianjian only smiled.

  After that time, Tianjian would come to sit for a while every three or four days. Manqian noticed that, except for one Sunday when he invited her and her husband out to a restaurant, Tianjian had never come on a Sunday. When Tianjian came, Caishu was usually at work. She knew that Tianjian enjoyed her company, and his affection for her subconsciously improved her own self-image. Besides adding a bit of mild excitement to her humdrum existence, his interest also restored her shaky self-confidence—proving that she had not passed her prime and that life had not completely eroded her charms.